Iterative learning for reliable sensor sourcing systems

Abstract

Providing a registry of sensor devices may comprise obtaining a device, determining one or more information types returned by the device, determining one or more communication protocols used by the device for transmitting information, determining one or more encoding schemes used by the device to format the information, adding the device to the registry of sensor devices including at least the one or more information types, the one or more communication protocols and the one or more encoding schemes, and allowing access to the registry of sensor devices.

We claim: 
     
       1. A method for providing a registry of sensor devices, comprising:
 receiving an addition request from a device, the addition request comprising at least an information type returned by the device, a communication protocol used by the device for transmitting information associated with the information type, and an encoding scheme used by the device to format the information; 
 adding the device to the registry of sensor devices including at least the information type returned by the device, the communication protocol and the encoding scheme; 
 allowing access to the registry of sensor devices; 
 transmitting, by a processor via a network, a request for information to a set of sensor devices registered in the registry of sensor devices that make same type of measurement requested in the information, using respective sensor device's communications protocols specified in the registry of sensor devices; 
 receiving, by the processor, the information from the set of sensor devices; and 
 updating in the registry of sensor devices, by the processor, a reliability factor of a sensor device in the set of sensor devices based on the information comprising measurements received from the set of sensor devices, the reliability factor indicating an accuracy of measurement data provided by the sensor device, the reliability factor of a sensor device incremented responsive to determining the measurement data provided by the sensor device matches to a degree sensor data provided by other sensor devices providing the same measurement type, the reliability factor of the sensor device decremented responsive to determining the measurement data does not match to the degree the sensor data provided by the other sensor devices providing the same measurement type; and 
 assigning a reliability factor value to the sensor device, 
 wherein a model type indicating manufacturer and model number of the sensor device is identified and the reliability factor value is assigned to other sensor devices having the same model type. 
 
     
     
       2. The method of  claim 1 , further comprising providing an application programming interface for interfacing with the registry of sensor devices for the information. 
     
     
       3. The method of  claim 1 , wherein the method is performed for a plurality of heterogeneous devices. 
     
     
       4. The method of  claim 1 , wherein the allowing access comprises:
 receiving a request from a requestor for a device that provide a specified type of information; 
 determining a list of devices in the registry of sensors that provide the specified type of information; and 
 returning the list of devices to the requestor. 
 
     
     
       5. The method of  claim 4 , wherein the returning further comprises returning the list of devices with at least the communication protocol and the encoding scheme associated with each of the devices in the list. 
     
     
       6. The method of  claim 4 , wherein the request further comprises a constraint associated with the device requested, and the determining the list of devices in the registry of sensors further comprises selecting at least one device in the registry that satisfy the constraint. 
     
     
       7. The method of  claim 6 , wherein the constraint comprises at least one location constraint, and the list of devices in the registry of sensors are queried in real-time to determine current location of each of the devices to determine at least one constraint that satisfies the at least one location constraint. 
     
     
       8. The method of  claim 1 , the reliability factor value comprising one of: not fully assessed; highly reliable, average reliable, and unreliable.